The Seriousness of Vows and the Character of God

Numbers Chapter 30: The Regulations of Vows

Numbers 30:1-16

Day 88. Ontario is dragging its feet. Churches re-opened but a number need a week or longer to be able to get ready to meet all the requirements. My wife still can’t get an appointment at her hair salon. At least up to ten people (from different families) can actually get together now – but I guess they still need to keep all the safety requirements. Meanwhile, Covid-19 global statistics continue to improve, and the mortality rate is now only 5.46% of all those that have been tested and were positive. [Or put another way, approx. ½ of 1/100 of 1 percent of the world population – not exactly a real pandemic in my view.]  While the world worries about all the permanent impacts this will have on our world, our economy, our cultures, etc., we press on with what really matters. And that is, knowing God and His word. Our study in Numbers, looking for scriptural gems continues. Thanks for joining us as we look at Numbers chapter 30.

The Passage

30 Then Moses spoke to the heads of the tribes of the sons of Israel, saying, “This is the word which the Lord has commanded. ² If a man makes a vow to the Lord, or takes an oath to bind himself with a binding obligation, he shall not violate his word; he shall do according to all that proceeds out of his mouth.

³ “Also if a woman makes a vow to the Lord, and binds herself by an obligation in her father’s house in her youth, ⁴ and her father hears her vow and her obligation by which she has bound herself, and her father ^[a]says nothing to her, then all her vows shall stand and every obligation by which she has bound herself shall stand. ⁵ But if her father should forbid her on the day he hears of it, none of her vows or her obligations by which she has bound herself shall stand; and the Lord will forgive her because her father had forbidden her.
⁶ “However, if she should ^[b]marry while ^[c]under her vows or the rash statement of her lips by which she has bound herself, ⁷ and her husband hears of it and says nothing to her on the day he hears it, then her vows shall stand and her obligations by which she has bound herself shall stand. ⁸ But if on the day her husband hears of it, he forbids her, then he shall annul her vow which ^[d]she is under and the rash statement of her lips by which she has bound herself; and the Lord will forgive her.
⁹ “But the vow of a widow or of a divorced woman, everything by which she has bound herself, shall stand against her. ¹⁰ However, if she vowed in her husband’s house, or bound herself by an obligation with an oath, ¹¹ and her husband heard it, but said nothing to her and did not forbid her, then all her vows shall stand and every obligation by which she bound herself shall stand. ¹² But if her husband indeed annuls them on the day he hears them, then whatever proceeds out of her lips concerning her vows or concerning the obligation of herself shall not stand; her husband has annulled them, and the Lord will forgive her.
¹³ “Every vow and every binding oath to humble herself, her husband may confirm it, or her husband may annul it. ¹⁴ But if her husband indeed says nothing to her from day to day, then he confirms all her vows or all her obligations which are on her; he has confirmed them, because he said nothing to her on the day he heard them. ¹⁵ But if he indeed annuls them after he has heard them, then he shall bear her guilt.”
¹⁶ These are the statutes which the Lord commanded Moses, as between a man and his wife, and as between a father and his daughter, while she is in her youth in her father’s house.

Footnotes

1. Numbers 30:4 Lit is silent to her, and so throughout the ch
2. Numbers 30:6 Lit be to a husband
3. Numbers 30:6 Lit her vows are on her
4. Numbers 30:8 Lit is on her

Thoughts on the Passage

Moses is still around even though Joshua has been appointed as the one to take over after Moses dies. And he calls the heads of the tribes together to give them what God has instructed with respect to any vows that is made a) to the Lord, and b) the person with an obligation.

Before we proceed, it may be worth our while to get a decent definition of the word ‘vow’. Generally, we find that it means to make a solemn promise to do a specified thing. It also means to make oneself be dedicated to someone or something, especially a deity.

Do you ever wonder why God says certain things to Moses at certain times? I do. Why on earth does the topic of vows come up here and now, following a chapter or two on offerings and special days? Matthew Henry proposes this idea: he suggests that since God’s instructions regarding vows in this chapter are presented to the leaders of the various tribes, it is possible that an issue had arisen with respect to vows and the leaders had asked Moses to settle it, and he in turn, went to God. That is a possibility. We do not know. Nor does it matter – but it does help to explain the order and timing of these things.

So, the first instruction is really the bottom line and it is addressed primarily to men [“If a man makes a vow. . . vs. 2] – you vow, you don’t violate that vow, and you do according to what you voiced you would in your vow.

Chuck Smith points out that elsewhere the Bible tells us that it is better not to vow at all than to vow and to break it (Ecclesiastes 5:5). Also, Smith reminds us that vows, even to God, are always voluntary. There’s no requirement to make a vow. Think of marriage vows. Or think of a vow a Catholic nun may make.

Smith also reminds us that some vows in the Bible were really unfortunate ones and ended up tragically. One excellent example is the one made by Jephthah in Judges 11:30-40.

Then God turns His attention to the vows of women. First to those who make vows while still in their father’s household. Her vow stands if her father hears it and says nothing. But if he objects and forbids it, the young woman is freed from her vows.

If we rush past this part of the passage quickly, we’ll miss something very important about the character and values of God Himself. First, God is aware that oftentimes young people make rash vows that are not always in their best interests. He created us and thus He knows us well.  Secondly, He instituted the family unit and values the role of the father in that unit. So, if dad forbids the vow, it no longer stands. God is not interested here in having a young maiden overrule the head of the family.

Robert Jamieson tells us that according to Jewish writers, the rules of vows that pertain between a father and a daughter also included vows made by male children that were minors. That makes sense to me. And is easy to think of examples were a clever lad may make some oath to someone, or God, and give the farm away to the dismay of his parents. Well, I’m sure dad would have something to say about that. And the wonderful thing is that God understands that.

Then God describes what happens if the girl’s father is okay with the vow, but then she gets married. Now if her husband hears of her vows and does not object, then her obligation to the Lord stands. But if when he hears her vows, he forbids her to adhere to them, they are annulled, and she is forgiven by the Lord.

In verse 9, God deals with a widow or a divorced woman and indicates that her personal vows, and I am assuming (based on verses 10-12) that means if not nullified earlier by her father or husband as per the earlier verses, are still valid and remain her obligation, even though she may return to live with her father’s family.

Verse 14 tells us that awareness of the vows by the husband and his subsequent silence, keeps them in place. But then verse 15 says, if he hears them and then annuls them – “he bears her guilt”. What does that mean? David Guzik says, “If the husband confirmed his wife's vow (either specifically or by silence), then he was responsible to make sure the vow was fulfilled”, otherwise he himself is just as guilty.

Now some students of this chapter may be asking themselves as I did, “Why would God only address the vows of women here?”. Well, I’ve always believed that when one has a question about something in the Bible, just keep reading ahead or go back and read what came before, and the answer will show up.  Or put another way, “scripture answers scripture”. And that it does here as well. In verse 16 we read that these specific statutes were intended to be between a man and his wife, or between a father and his unmarried daughter. Well, what about men and their vows? Read back to verse 2 of the chapter.  Men have no option – the cardinal rule of making an oath applies to them. Their daddies can’t get them out of it, nor t heir grand-daddies, and neither can their wives. There’s no room for making insincere or rash vows to God for men. So, ladies, before you go on about God being unfair to women, think again – here’s another case where, in His benevolence, and His desire, to maintain the family unit – first between husband and wife, and secondly between father and child – allows grace in the case of vows that need to changed or annulled for women.

The question also arises here as to whether or not Christians should ever make oaths. Some take Matthew 5:34-37 as their rationale and say Jesus was forbidding oaths or vows. David Guzik says a closer look at that passage and a review of the rest of scripture may suggest that this passage was really not forbidding vows or oaths, but promoting that we live a life of total integrity (let our yes be yes and our no be no) so that vows and oaths become unnecessary in daily living. Having said that, we are reminded that Jesus answered under oath in a court (Matthew 26:63-64), and God Himself swears oaths (Luke 1:73, Acts 2:30, Hebrews 3:18, 6:13, 17).

There are more lessons for us to consider or gems to gather. Henry suggests we need to be careful that we don’t make vows we can’t keep out a zeal for God that we cannot maintain. Again, best not to have made it. Secondly, sometimes we make vows or oaths out of shame for a sin that we have committed. I understand the psychology involved and the urge to feel that you are paying for your sin, but woe to you or me, if we can’t keep that vow. Better to just repent and do all we can not to repeat the sin.

Thirdly, we should consider some benefits of making reasonable vows. For example, if I were a gambling man, I’d lose a lot of money. I’d probably at some point promise my wife (not to mention God) that I would never gamble again. That vow or promise may well keep me from sinning that way in the future. You can place in that example any sort of vice that is a greater temptation to you. If you have any self-respect, any love for your wife, and any desire to please God, that vow not to be involved in _________ again, can well help you.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to watch a 2018 documentary entitled “American [Christ Alone] Gospel”.  I highly recommend it for Christians – it may be too confusing for non-Christians. Anyway, one of the many things that I learned was the entire Bible only has one Hero in it – God. And while our Sunday School teachers may have taught us otherwise, as adults we need to read every story looking for how God (or His Son or the Holy Spirit) stars in it and no one else. So, I decided yesterday that often we miss the real point of a passage of Scripture, because we are caught up with the action that took place in it, rather than how God was being presented and glorified in it.

With that in mind, we can then ask ourselves, what does this passage tell me about God and how does it confirm His character and attributes in a way that makes me want to love Him more and serve Him better?

For me, Numbers 28 points out our God is a serious God and we are not play games with Him. And it points out that our God is a loving God who often gives us an out when we act rashly because of brevity in years and the experiences that go with it.

I’d love it if you shared what this passage tells you about God. Thanks for joining us.

It would be great if you would share your thoughts or questions on this blog in the comments section below or on social media.

"Obedience leads to true freedom. . . ." captures the essence of this Old Testament passage.

Leviticus 26:1-13 Basic Requirements, Conditions, and Results of Obedience

Day 28. Celebrating (not sure that’s the right word) 4 weeks of self-isolation, the first two of which were mandatory self-quarantine. Today I had the privilege of teaching the first day of a three-day on-line class to Human Resources personnel in Canada and the U.S. So, my socializing was via Zoom. It was a welcomed relief. My study in Leviticus continues even if later in the day. The stress of family and friends beyond our immediate household continues due to the isolation, the loss of work, etc. But God is still there and He upholds us. Thanks for joining me today and read on.

I do not often quote leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but I thought this quote of James E. Faust, a famous Mormon religious leader, lawyer, and politician, well reflected the contents of our passage today:

"Obedience leads to true freedom. The more we obey revealed truth,

the more we become liberated."

The Passage

26 ‘You shall not make for yourselves ^[a]idols, nor shall you set up for yourselves an image or a sacred pillar, nor shall you place a figured stone in your land to bow down ^[b]to it; for I am the Lord your God. ² You shall keep My sabbaths and reverence My sanctuary; I am the Lord. ³ If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments so as to carry them out, ⁴ then I shall give you rains in their season, so that the land will yield its produce and the trees of the field will bear their fruit. ⁵ Indeed, your threshing will last for you until grape gathering, and grape gathering will last until sowing time. You will thus eat your ^[c]food to the full and live securely in your land. ⁶ I shall also grant peace in the land, so that you may lie down with no one making you tremble. I shall also eliminate harmful beasts from the land, and no sword will pass through your land. ⁷ But you will chase your enemies and they will fall before you by the sword; ⁸ five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand, and your enemies will fall before you by the sword. ⁹ So I will turn toward you and make you fruitful and multiply you, and I will confirm My covenant with you. ¹⁰ You will eat the old supply and clear out the old because of the new. ¹¹ Moreover, I will make My ^[d]dwelling among you, and My soul will not ^[e]reject you. ¹² I will also walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people. ¹³ I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt so that you would not be their slaves, and I broke the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect.

Footnotes:

1. Leviticus 26:1 Or graven images
2. Leviticus 26:1 Lit over
3. Leviticus 26:5 Lit bread
4. Leviticus 26:11 Or tabernacle
5. Leviticus 26:11 Lit abhor

Thoughts on the Passage

David Guzik says that as a literary form, “this chapter is similar to ancient treaties between a king and his people; this is God the King, making a covenant with His people, Israel.

Idols or inanimate objects (pillars, stone, etc.) are out. Robert Jamieson says this about these pillars of stone:

[A pillar of stone] is, an obelisk, inscribed with hieroglyphical and superstitious characters; the former denoting the common and smaller pillars of the Syrians or Canaanites; the latter, pointing to the large and elaborate obelisks which the Egyptians worshipped as guardian divinities, or used as stones of adoration to stimulate religious worship. The Israelites were [urged and warned] to beware of them.

You don’t bow down to anything. You keep the Sabbath and reverence the Sanctuary of God. You walk in His statutes and keep His commandments.  That’s the input.

Here’s the outputs: In verse 4, God promises enough rain to yield corps and fruits. And these will be so good that your whole year will be taken up with the associated activities (verse 5). He also promises that we will have sufficient food and live securely in our land.

In verse 6, God promises peace – the kind of peace that allows us to sleep at night. [Unlike the sleep people had during WWI and WWII – being awakened by sirens when the bombing was about to start.] But not only peace from human enemies, but also peace from wild beasts.

In fact, God says (in verses 7 and 8) that the Israelites, His people, will be able to chase our enemies and conquer them, even if they outnumber us twenty to one, or 100 to one.

But better still, God says (verse 9), He will turn towards the Israelites and make them fruitful with offspring and confirm His covenant with them.

Verse 10 is an interesting verse which states that the Israelites will “eat the old supply and clear it out” because He will keep giving them a new supply. Jamieson puts it another way when he says the Israelites will have so much grain that they won’t be able to exhaust it before the next year’s crop is ready to store – so they’ll have to throw some out. That’s bountiful supply.

And then it gets better in verse 11. God will dwell among them and I love, His “soul will reject” them. Wow. Can you imagine that kind of assurance? That kind of promise? A promise that He will walk with them and be their God and they His people. What more could anyone with any amount of smarts would want?

And why would He do all this if they keep His commandments? Simple: Because He is the Lord their God Who brought them out of slavery, freed them, and broke their chains so they would never be slaves again, but instead they could walk “erect” like free men. You have to love that kind of God. Guzik says this about the verse:

This final blessing speaks of freedom and dignity. This passage almost feels like the New Testament, God proclaims the liberty of His people and then invites them to walk in it.

Chuck Smith points out the things that God promised the Israelites here are the very things men are looking for today – security and peace and growth. Jesus says we can have all these things but not if we seek them, but only if we seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness (Matthew 6:33).

Matthew Henry points out that in His promises, God covers all of man’s basic needs in one or another. This is amazing. God knows the man He has created and knows our needs. And His promises take care of all we need. From physical protection, to food, to family growth, and to respect or dignity.

And amazingly, even though this chapter is in the Old Testament, the same promises have been applied to God’s children today – through His Son, Jesus Christ.  What a passage this is.  Do the five things God wants us to do, and God will the myriad of things He promises. In business we would call this a “no-brainer”.  But yet so many miss out of the deal of eternity.

So just remember as you wait out this Covid-19 storm, as a Child of His, you are well taken care of. Throw the worry away. Throw the fear away. Today I saw this image on social media and I think it fits well here.

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Fear survives at the expense of Faith in God. Increase your Faith in God as your Provider of all your needs and reclaim your lost peace that your fear has stolen. 

It would be great if you would share your thoughts or questions on this blog in the comments section below or on social media.

Thinking Twice Before Promising God Anything.

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Our Rash Promises to God

Exodus 24:3: Then Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the Lord and all the ordinances; and all the people answered with one voice, and said, “All the words which the Lord has spoken we will do!”

After God tells Moses what He wants Him to do next, Moses goes down the mountain and tells the Israelites all that God has said from Exodus 20:1 to 24:2. Then verse 3 tells us that ‘all the people’ answered with ‘one voice’ saying, “We will do all that God said.”

God had given them all His instructions, His laws, and His ordinances.  What we have here in verse 3 of this chapter is the people accepting the conditions for the promises. (Collectively and as one which is interesting in itself – did anyone have a differing opinion?)  In short, here we have a “Covenant between God and His People” that really needed as much thought put into accepting it as God had put into offering it.  Later in the chapter, we will see the preparations for a ratification of the Covenant celebration. Let us for the moment stick to this verse and the utterance of the people.

Commentator David Guzik suggests, “Israel here is perhaps guilty of tremendous over-confidence. The way they seemed to easily say to God, "we will keep Your law" seems to lack appreciation for how complete and searching God's law is.” But Guzik also goes on to explain why they may have been so.  He writes, “However, a nation that had been terrified by God's awesome presence at Sinai was in no state of mind to do anything but agree with God.”  I am not so sure. I believe had the “awesomeness” of God been met with humility by the Israelites, they may well have said, “God we want to obey your words and keep your Covenant but we need your help to do so.”

Matthew Henry adds some interesting insights. Henry points out Moses did not snow the Israelites but rather explained all that God had said in detail and then “fairly put it to them whether they were willing to submit to these laws or no.”  And he continues, “The people unanimously consented to the terms proposed, without reservation or exception.”

Back in Exodus 19:1-8 they had already consented to be under God’s government (to be His people and He would be their God), but now they needed to agree to His laws.  Henry says, “Many consent to the law, and yet do not live up to it; they have nothing to except against it, and yet will not persuade themselves to be ruled by it.” Yet in so doing, they had signed on the dotted line – if they observed His requirements, He would fulfill His promises. They just had to obey.

Chuck Smith on the other hand, is much harder on the Israelites. He says “The Children of Israel lied to God when they said that they would do all that God commanded them to do.”  I would challenge him on this.  When does a failure to comply become a lie? For example, if a man said to his beloved, “I love you with all my heart and always will”, did he lie at the point when he said that, or does that turn into a lie at the point when he leaves her for someone else? I think the latter but we’ll leave Smith alone for the moment as he was trying to make a point. And that being, that we too have often had our words become lies when we have not kept our promises to God.

He goes on to point out that God knew that we would be lying when we promise to keep His laws or make other promises we have broken. Sometimes we say we will “do” something and don’t.  Sometimes we promise “not to do” something again and do. We have a natural bent and history in behaving that way. So why do we make promises to God?

Unfortunately, it is often to make a deal with God. Smith would agree with us that the problem is not a lack of sincerity.  We mean it when we promise something to God and that is proven by the fact that we are often so very disappointed with ourselves when we “blow it again”. But Smith says there’s a bright side to this whole thing:

“God is never disappointed when you break your promise. He knew all the time that you could not keep it. You see, making a vow is to put trust in our flesh, and Paul said, I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, there dwells no good thing.”

He suggests one possible answer to our failures to keep our promises to God is simply not to make them. Instead, we need to ask God to help us do what is right and to help us overcome the flesh. But we cannot do nothing. It is not okay to simply fail and leave things at that and just go on merrily being, or calling ourselves, Christians. If that were the case, Christianity would be no different than other religions. So, another provision was made for us.  Smith continues:

“Jesus not only taught the right way to live, He fully practiced what he preached. He made provisions for forgiveness for failure. He then promised to come and indwell your life to give you the power to live the way God wants us to live. He said, ‘You will receive power after the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you shall be witnesses of me. In that day you shall know that I am in my Father, and you are in Me, and I am in you.’”

Finally, Smith writes, “God has not changed His laws to accommodate our weakness. But He has taken residence within us to empower us to keep His ideal. Paul explains this in Romans 8.”

If we do nothing else about failures from here on in, may we think twice before we rush to promise God anything? But better still, may we realize that when we do fail, God does not want us to remain in the “failure” category in anything that we do. He has provided a way for us.

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It would be great if you would share your thoughts or questions on this blog in the comments section below or on social media.